The First Secretary of the Mari regional branch of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the position of highest authority in the Mari AO (1920–1936) and the Mari ASSR (1936–1991) in the Russian SFSR of the Soviet Union. The position was created on February 24, 1921, and abolished on August 25, 1991. The First Secretary was a de facto appointed position usually by the Politburo or the General Secretary himself.
| Name | Term of Office | Life years | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Start | End | |||
| First Secretaries of the Communist Party | ||||
| Aleksandr Bolodurin | February 24, 1921 | August 15, 1921 | 1895–1926 | |
| Nikolay Butenin | August 18, 1921 | March 15, 1922 | 1884–1938 | |
| Nikolay Yezhov | March 15, 1922 | November 1922 | 1895–1940 | |
| Pyotr Lezhnyev-Finkovsky | November 1922 | June 21, 1923 | ||
| Ivan Ivanov | June 21, 1923 | December 10, 1926 | ||
| Vasily Kulikov | December 10, 1926 | July 27, 1929 | 1892–? | |
| Sergey Kutuzov | July 30, 1929 | May 22, 1930 | 1882–? | |
| Ali Geydar Shirvani (Mustafabekov) | May 1930 | January 10, 1935 | 1896–1938 | |
| Cheslav Vrublevski | January 10, 1935 | November 1937 | 1900–? | |
| Zinovy Zhadnov | November 1937 | May 20, 1938 | 1904–1938 | |
| Vasily Arkhipov | May 20, 1938 | February 26, 1939 | 1908–? | |
| Veniamin Kushnarev | March 2, 1939 | April 30, 1942 | ||
| Fyodor Navozov | April 30, 1942 | July 9, 1945 | 1910–? | |
| Ivan Kolokolkin | July 9, 1945 | September 1948 | 1905–1969 | |
| Grigory Kondratyev | September 1948 | October 4, 1951 | 1912–1993 | |
| Aleksey Spiridonov | October 4, 1951 | December 28, 1957 | 1909–1988 | |
| Georgy Pavlov | December 29, 1957 | November 28, 1963 | 1910–1991 | |
| Pyotr Urayev | November 29, 1963 | July 22, 1967 | 1910–1967 | |
| Viktor Nikonov | August 4, 1967 | September 5, 1979 | 1929–1993 | |
| Ivan Gusev | September 5, 1979 | January 16, 1981 | 1930– | |
| Grigory Posibyev | January 16, 1981 | August 25, 1991 | 1935–2002 | |